From a crackdown on a young “outlaw gang,” to the death of a Cameron native in the attack on Pearl Harbor, to a series of testimony meant to keep the Pennsylvania Railroad service in Olean, to a halting of payment from Salamanca to the Seneca Nation of Indians, here’s a look back at the week that was 100, 75, 50 and 25 years ago in this edition of Turning Back the Clock.
1917
Feb. 20 — Exactly 99 immigrants appear before Cattaraugus County Clerk F.M. Merrill in the Olean city courtroom to make application for citizenship in the United States. “This is a far greater number than the county clerk had expected and included two women and a boy under the age of 18,” the Olean Evening Times reports. All of the applicants will have to wait two years before they can be admitted as citizens — while some were informed they had to provide more documentation of their homeland, upon what ship they arrived and the certification of their arrival date at Ellis Island.
Feb. 25 — Olean Police Chief Dempsey reports to the Evening Times that he and his officers have “pretty much dispersed” a group of local youths who fancy themselves as a budding “outlaw gang,” with a sort of clubhouse on the sidehill above what is now the Bartlett Country Club. The chief says the youths are enamored with the likes of Jesse James and bands of pirates after their reading of several dime novels, which are popular in the day. A early rite of passage in the group apparently is to skip Sunday school, the chief says. “Cussing, chewing tobacco and smoking cigarettes are evidence enough of a candidate’s fitness for membership.”
Feb. 26 — The Franklinville-area farmhouse of the Thayer Waring family is destroyed by fire on Bear Creek, about 4 miles from the village. No injuries are reported.
1942
Feb. 20 — Wellsville learns that the New York Yankees will field a new team in the village in the Pennsylvania-Ontario-New York — PONY — League, bringing professional baseball back to Wellsville for the first time in nearly 20 years. Approval must be made by PONY League officials, but that is considered a formality on the part of local team officials.
Feb. 23 — High wind causes a car driven on Route 17 by John Scarlato of Allegany, about 3 miles west of the village, to skip across the icy roadway and into a ditch near Rockcut. Scarlato and his sister, Louise, a passenger in the car, are taken to St. Francis Hospital in Olean, where Louise was soon to start a new job as a nurse. State police say the siblings suffered bruises and lacerations in the freak accident.
Feb. 25 — Official word is received by the Emporium, Pa., family of Gunner’s Mate Robert E. Cline that he was indeed lost in the sinking of the U.S.S. Arizona during the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7. Cline, 25, who attended Emporium Junior High School before he joined the Navy at age 14, is the first confirmed Cameron County native to have been killed in World War II.
1967
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Feb. 20 — Several witnesses, including Olean Mayor Harvey L. Schneiderman; Alfred N. Eno, personnel director of the Agway plant on Buffalo Street; and Jonathan B. Bates, executive vice president of the Olean Area Chamber of Commerce, testify during an Interstate Commerce Commission meeting on the proposed discontinuance of Pennsylvania Railroad service through Olean, connecting Buffalo to Baltimore. The local witnesses all testified that discontinuing the service would hurt Olean residents as well as industry — Agway, later in the week, would ship out its first tank car of nitric acid from the plant, which had been under development since 1965.
Feb. 23 — About a dozen elm trees in Olean’s Boardman Park are cut down because they are afflicted with Dutch elm disease. A total of 36 elms on city property are scheduled to be cut down because of the tree malady.
Feb. 24 — Olean Bishop Walsh’s boys basketball team finishes its regular season at 18-0, following a 71-66 win over Allegany Central. Danny Metzler, Walsh’s top scorer on the season, scores 14 to lead his team.
1992
Feb. 22 — The Salamanca City Council votes to stop payment of $751,313 to the Seneca Nation of Indians, its lease payment for 1992, a day after a congressional committee in Washington denied a request to review the Seneca lease situation. One of the specific issues that opponents of the lease agreement with the Senecas have is who actually owns the structures that are built on Seneca land.
Feb. 25 — Hindered by an economic recession, Petrowax PA, Inc., with a refinery in Farmers Valley in McKean County, Pa., files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in federal court. The refinery in the Smethport area employs 147, while another Petrowax plant in Emlenton, Pa., employs 71 workers.